Decluttering your way towards happiness- The KonMari way!
One of the hot topics of 2019 has been the importance of decluttering. How to let go of possessions while organizing is something that people need tuitions on. A mess and a cluster around you is known to create a mess in your mind!
The internet is flooded on how minimalism is taking over. The Japanese are famous for their obsession to be minimalists. The desire for simplicity inside out has created a movement in Japan where people strive hard to possess nothing but what they genuinely need to live an enriched life. “Ma” pronounced as “Maah” is a concept that drives the Japanese minimalism. It simply means losing the fear of negative spaces or empty spaces. Celebrating and cherishing not things but the space between them is the meaning behind the word. When there is a lot of clutter in space, too many things crammed up, the Japanese define the space having not enough Ma which is definitely not a good thing. Ma is said to be like an empty bucket which can be filled with goodness. Its a way of cherishing possibilities and promises which are yet to be fulfilled.
Marie Kondo, 34, a determined Japanese woman, has now become a global icon only by helping people get organized, declutter and make their homes look more appealing and functional. In her book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying up: the Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organising, she has mentioned how one needs to put in efforts and time to detox and declutter the home, refrigerator, counters, closets garages and even electronic devices like timelines, pages, laptops, and cell phones. She explains how it helps detoxify your mind and life on a whole. This Japanese author has become a hit in the American readers’ circuit and through her book, she became a star, a sensation overnight. This independent decluttering consultant lists among the top 100 most influential people of 2015. See now hosts TV show named cleaning up with Marie Kondo. Even watching people opening up the privacy of homes to an audience and cleaning up their closets and inner kitchen shelves have proven to be calming and soothing on the minds of the audience watching the show. Marie Kondo stresses on organizing, decluttering and donating in the KonMari way. KonMari refers to a method that helps people tidy up their space, transform their lives and spark joy. People are glued to the television trying to take tips and tricks of the KonMari method. The KonMari method in a gist is as follows:
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Bring joy and take the stress off when you look at a clutter or a messy space. Just know that it is going to be temporary and cherish the presence of the mess in the present, only to know that it is not going to last forever.
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Imagine the end result and how you want it to be after you put in efforts, time and energy in decluttering. Constantly imagining the ideal space and the beautiful area after you finish organizing. This always encourages you to move in the right direction.
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Marie Kondo stresses on how it is important to tidy not location wise but category wise. Categorize- Books, toys, papers, clothes and miscellaneous stuff and in the end items that hold emotional or sentimental value.
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Constantly ask yourself if a particular item sparks joy in your life. By ‘Spark Joy’ we mean to refer to that extra happiness that you get from a particular materialistic thing. Keep only those things that spark that extra joy and give happiness to your heart. Discard everything else no matter how antique or expensive it is. If it does not impart that extra happiness then it is of no use.
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Discarding items which hold sentimental values like your late grandparent’s clothes or your ex’s gifts should be done in the end after you are done with tiding of everything else. It is easy to make decisions in the end because by then you know what truly sparks joy in your heart.
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Using organizers and folding things in a particular way is the key to tidying up. Each item that you possess in your house deserves love, respect, and purpose. So, be it a pin or a spoon, everything has to have a place of its own kept in a way that it is accessible in seconds.
“The question of what you want to own is actually the question of how you want to lead your life”, says Marie Kondo. As per several famous psychologists and per neuroscientists from the Princeton University, decluttering and organizing increases efficiency, performance standards and decreases stress level substantially. Happy tidying up you all!
Image credits: hip2save.com
